In numerous industrial and commercial, as well as in residential environments, means under pressure are utilized for applying and discharging fluid, such as water, for cleaning and like washing applications. Further, to effect good cleaning or scouring of the work, it is desirable to impart motion to the spray fluid as by rotation or other motion of the spray fluid nozzle means so as to impact all available areas of the work, as well as to effect fluid impingement thereagainst at varying angles to assist in dislodging and flusing dirt or other unwanted matter.
To this end, it is generally known to utilize rotary spinning sprayheads for delivering sprays of liquid as water, with or without detergents or additives, onto work to be treated, as in automobile washing operations. Such rotary sprayheads are conventionally spun by one or more electric motors, depending upon the size of the installation and other factors.
It is evident that the use of electric motors to effect rotation of sprayheads and the like is undesirable in water and similar relative electrolyte environments, and therefore requires careful attention and expense in the proper installation and insulation of any electricity source from the water being sprayed from such motor-driven nozzles to minimize hazard to employees and customers. While this can be achieved in a complex and high-tech environment where costs are not critical, such physical precautions in relatively low cost business and retail installations as automobile wash lanes and the like is economically disadvantageous, and wherein further the attending personnel as well as customers may be relatively unskilled, thereby enhancing shock hazard conditions.
In order to reduce the hazard and cost in simpler installations, hydraulic motors have been employed to effect spinning of sprayheads delivering showers of water onto a car or other work. Heretofore, however, hydraulic motors were generally incapable of effecting the high rotational speeds desirable to effect multi-angle and quickly repetitive scouring of the work by one or more rotating spray heads while still providing adequate blast pressure of the water from the spray head nozzles. Conversely, high pressure water has been employed with relatively fixed nozzles for scour cleaning, wherein the water pressure is not also relied upon to drive rotating sprayheads or the like. In all such devices, it is equally important that water be conserved as much as possible while still effecting the cleaning task. Efforts to provide a relatively low cost, rugged, and effective reaction nozzle in this regard have not been successful.
Typical of the known teachings with respect to the foregoing are U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,904,115 to Adams ; 4,562,848 Messing et al; 3,495,287 Freimanis; 3,447,505 Wagner and 3,431,580 Cirino et al, among others.
It is known generally to employ reaction-driven spray nozzles for car wash equipment and the like in prior patents such as U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,409,030 Schmidt or 3,593,730 Burchett. Such equipment however cannot achieve the desired high speed spin of the nozzles coupled with sufficient spray pressure for scouring as required.